


The Mistake

by JunoInferno



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Non-magical AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-09-28
Updated: 2015-10-16
Packaged: 2018-04-23 18:40:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4887655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JunoInferno/pseuds/JunoInferno
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Summary: Rumford Gold is a lonely man who falls for the new librarian, Belle French, but she’s not interested in him or any other man. Also, Belle French falls for the town landlord Rumford Gold, but can’t figure out why he won’t respond to her flirting or date offers?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Rumford Gold was a lonely man.

It was a perfect storm of factors, really. He was long divorced, he had devoted himself to raising his son and managing his pawnshop and real estate holdings in Storybrooke. The latter meant he owned most of the town and no one really wanted to spend a lot of time with their landlord. Then Bae had grown up, gone to college and was now solidly starting his life in New York. He had just gotten married and he and his new bride had very little time to drive up to Maine to visit him.

Or they really didn’t want to.

There was also the problem that he didn’t like most people. People were stupid and petty and how could they be so happy all the time? How could they not look at the world and not see everything that was wrong with it.

In other words, he was miserable.

Then the new librarian arrived in Storybrooke. He made his first visit to the building in years, intending to explain clearly the process of paying the rent, but then he met the librarian.

Belle French was a vision and the first person in years to make him feel something other than contempt.

So he borrowed some books instead.

Then brought them back and borrowed new ones, stealing conversation with the librarian along the way. She was so pleasant and most astonishingly, she didn’t hate him. She smiled, she laughed at his jokes and when he was with her, Gold felt as if the cloud of loneliness that followed him around was lifted for a time.

He was seriously thinking of asking her to dinner, something he hadn’t done in about thirty years and then one night he went to the Rabbit Hole to collect on back rent. He was surprised to see the librarian and Miss Lucas. They were dancing together when Mark Gaston tried to intrude, becoming rather insistent. He was about to put the brute in his place when Belle became rather insistent that she was with Ruby.

With Ruby.

She was a lesbian. They were lesbians. They were lesbians together.

Gold didn’t remember much of that night after he arrived home and opened a bottle of fifty year old Scotch, but he awoke with a hell of a hangover and the knowledge that he and Belle would just be friends, if they even were that rather than just landlord and tenant, librarian and patron.

Gold has only himself to blame for presuming she might be interested and letting himself indulge this little fantasy.  

It was months later when Mr. Gold entered the library, following his usual routine. He couldn’t give up the visits, they were the only thing like human contact he got.

He soon saw Will Scarlet standing at the circulation desk, taking up the librarian’s valuable time. Her eyes flicked up at him- and she did have lovely eyes- and she smiled as she bit her lip. She turned her attention back to Will and Rum walked over to the display of books the librarian had organized. She changed them every few weeks, dedicated to a certain theme and little props added. 

Will continued to grate Gold’s patience by speaking. “You’re sure you won’t come with me? It’s going to be a great time.”

“I’m sorry, Will. I’m going out with Ruby on Friday.”

“Okay, then. Fair enough.”

Gold pretended to be distracted as Will left and Belle approached.

“What do you think of my display?”

He looked up at her with wide eyes.

“The, uh, books?,” she said motioning back at the shelf.

“Ah, yes, of course.” He unsuccessfully bit back a cough. He nodded back at the books. “A very interesting selection.”

“It’s Pride month so I thought I should highlight that,” said Belle. “I’ve already gotten some curious looks.”

“That doesn’t come as a surprise. The people of this town have a tendency to be quite provincial.”

“Well, I haven’t found that.”

“Perhaps it’s just me then.”

“Perhaps it is,” she teased back. “What brings you to the library today, Mr. Gold?”

“Oh, I just wanted to return these.”

He held out some books and Belle smiled as she took them. He followed her as she walked back to the desk, perhaps taking too much appreciation in how her skirt swung.

“You would think the richest man in town could buy his own copies of Jane Austen.”

He shrugged. “That seems unnecessary when we have such a well-stocked library.”

“Or perhaps you just like the company...” she suggested with a smile.

“I don’t think so.”

“You know we have a book club that meets here at the library on Thursday evenings,” said Belle. “It’s Ruby, Ariel, Mulan, Aurora, Tink, Marian...”

“That’s very kind, but no thank you. I’m sure you wouldn’t want me there.”

“I’m sure we would.”

He shook his head. “No, thank you, though.”

“What about Friday?,” she said suddenly.

“What about it?”

“We could grab a burger. If you wanted. I know I hate to eat alone.”

“I doubt Miss Lucas would care for that.”

“What does Ruby have to do with it?”

“I heard you talking to Mr. Scarlet about your plans with Miss Lucas on Friday.”

“Oh, well, that’s flexible...”

“Miss French, I do appreciate what you’re trying to do, but you really needn’t trouble yourself.”

“What I’m trying to do...”

“Good day, Miss French.”

Rum left the shop feeling like an utter fool. Bad enough to be lonely, worse still to have Belle notice and even worse to have her feel so sorry for him as to actually offer to eat with him. He wondered how much further he had left in his descent into deeper loneliness before he would actually be willing to accept. Probably a few years, but by then Belle and Miss Lucas would probably be married and have adopted several children or whatever they chose to do, so she wouldn’t have time to make such a charitable offer. That would be good. He could at least die with his dignity until the sheriff broke into his house because of the stench coming off his decaying corpse.

Yes, that would be for the best.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My RCIJ Santa was ak-vintage and she wrote an amazing gift called Tessellate which you should go read. Anyway, she is waiting on a late RCIJ gift and I gave her this chapter in the meantime because she asked for Gold finding Ruby with someone else. 
> 
> I might have been a little heavy-handed with the crack. Hope you like it, ak-vintage!

Summer passed like molasses in Storybrooke which Rum hated. All of those schoolchildren running free around town, all those clam bakes and barbeques that he never got invited- not that he wanted to go of course- to and of course, the centerpiece of Rum’s hatred of the season, the Fourth of July celebration.

It wasn’t that Rum hated the concept behind the celebration of his adopted land’s birth. It was that everyone in town spent four days- sometimes more- celebrating like morons and giving lame rent excuses which involved claiming the third was a holiday and how could the rent be late on a holiday? Then he had to inform them, no, the third was not a holiday so the rent was not on time on the fifth!

These arguments never seemed to stop.

There was one attempt from Miss French to engage him by saying they could watch the fireworks together. That was all he needed. More pity. She would probably put a blanket on his lap and give him a glass of warm milk as well.

Rum barricaded himself in his house as soon as possible, cooking a simple meal and drinking half a bottle of Scotch. It was this bottle of Scotch that led to his confusion when he woke up.

The PBS documentary he had been watching had ended and in its place was Neil Diamond giving a concert on the National Mall to a crowd that seemed deeply engaged in singing along to “Sweet Caroline.” That was not the problem, though.

He heard something out front. Some sort of moaning and groaning. He assumed it was teenagers and mentally calculated the odds of getting to his garden hose before they noticed. Who said this holiday couldn’t be fun?

When he went out front he found that it was not teenagers but Doctor Whale who was out front acting with the hormones of a teenager.

“Excuse me, dearie...”

Whale froze and looked up in terror. Perhaps it would have been fun to get the garden hose. Rum considered how many steps it would be as he pondered next quip and Whale began to stand hurriedly when Rum noticed his companion.

Miss Lucas.

Miss Lucas who was supposed to be in love with Belle.

What happened to the lesbian thing? Was she... bisexual? Did Belle know?

“Sorry, Mr. Gold,” said Whale.

“Sorry,” Ruby added sheepishly.

Rum was about to say something about who she really ought to be apologizing too but they escaped into the moonlight.

He barricaded himself once more and pondered the situation as Neil crooned “Love On The Rocks.” He was still pondering it when Neil encouraged the crowd to clap along to “America.”

_Everywhere around the world, they’re coming to America..._

Did Belle know? Was this some new concept he didn’t understand like friends with benefits? His daughter-in-law had turned the color of a tomato when she clued him on that.

No. He couldn’t imagine a scenario where Miss French would tolerate that. She’d expressed her distaste for the doctor on several occasions.

_Every time that flag’s unfurled, they’re coming to America..._

No, Miss French was being duped. It was his duty to tell her.

_Got a dream to take them there, they’re coming to America..._

* * *

The next day Rum awoke to thoughts of what the song “America” had to do with the ending of The Jazz Singer and pushed them aside as he began his day. Miss French would be at the library and he would tell her there. She was his friend after all.

It was on his way there that Gold remembered he used to have another friend before Belle. Long ago in Glasgow his mate, Aidan, had told him his former wife had been down at the pub, having a laugh and perhaps more at whatever sailors had been in town.

It was when he entered the library that Rum remembered that he had never spoken to Aidan again.

“Mr. Gold!” Belle beamed at him as she swished around the circulation desk. “I feel as if I haven’t seen you in forever.”

“Well, I...”

“I didn’t see you at the fireworks last night.”

“That’s because I didn’t go.”

“They were wonderful! You really ought to have come with us!”

He had never spoken to Aidan again even though he knew it was hardly his best friend’s fault that Milah turned out to be totally unfaithful. He had just never been able to forgive Aidan for being the one to tell him.

“Miss French, there’s something I must tell you...”

“Yes?” She looked at him brightly.

And it would be the same for Belle. Then he would have no one who looked the least bit pleased to see him or wonder why he wasn’t at one of the town’s obnoxious events. If he were a selfless man, he would just tell her anyway because she needed to know more than he needed her friendship.

Rum Gold never considered himself a selfless man...

Today would be no different.

He cleared his throat. “I need some reading material.”

“Oh,” said Belle. “Well, that’s a bit of a challenge. You’ve read almost as much as I have.”

He scoffed. “Hardly.”

“Hardy,” she said. “Have you read Hardy?”

“Not recently enough to recall it.”

She playfully frowned at him. “Jude the Obscure. What do you think?”

“If you insist.”

Belle cheerfully went through the process of checking him out. He took his book and made his way out as Miss Lucas walked in.

She turned absolutely red.

“Mr. Gold.”

He narrowed his eyes at her. “Miss Lucas.”

“Nice day out,” she tried to remark.

“I don’t know how you live with yourself...” he hissed as he exited past her.

So he would have a friend. He would be a terrible friend, but at least he would have a friend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I stand by my assertion that none of the songs in Neil Diamond's The Jazz Singer have anything to do with that film.


End file.
